A scientific hurdle in manufacturing solid films by drying colloidal layers is preventing them from fracturing. This paper examines how the drying rate of colloidal liquids influences the particle packing at the nanoscale in correlation with the crack patterns observed at the macroscale. Increasing the drying rate results in more ordered, denser solid structures, and the dried samples have more cracks.Yet, introducing a holding period (at a prescribed point) during the drying protocol results in a more disordered solid structure with significantly less cracks. To interpret these observations, this paper conjectures that a longer drying protocol favors the formation of aggregates. It is further argued that the number and size of the aggregates increase as the drying rate decreases. This results in the formation of a more disordered, porous film from the viewpoint of the particle packing, and a more resistant film, i.e. less cracks, from the macroscale viewpoint.
When using appropriate surfactants, oil and aqueous foam can be intimately mixed without the foam being destroyed. In this Letter, we show that a foam, initially free of oil, can draw an oil drop under the action of capillary forces and stretch it through the aqueous network. We focus on the suction of oil by a single horizontal foam channel, known as a Plateau border. In such confined channels, imbibition dynamics are governed by a balance between capillarity and viscosity. Yet, the scaling law for our system differs from that of classical imbibition in porous media such as aqueous foam. This is due to the particular geometry of the liquid channels: Plateau borders filled with foaming solution are always concave whereas they can be convex or flat when filled with oil. Finally, the oil slug, confined in the Plateau border, fragments into droplets following a film breakup.
When put in contact with a large liquid drop, dry foams wick owing to surface-tension-driven flows until reaching equilibrium. This work is devoted to the dynamics of this imbibition process. We consider imbibition of both wetting or nonwetting liquid, by putting the dry foam into contact either with the foaming solution that constitutes the foam or with organic oils. Indeed, with the appropriate choice of surfactants, oil spontaneously invades the liquid network of the foam without damaging it. Our experiments show an early-time dynamics in t(1/2) followed by a late-time dynamics in t(1/4). These features, which differ from theoretical works predicting a t(1/3) dynamics, are rationalized considering the influence of the initial liquid fraction of the foam in the driving capillary force and the impact of gravity through the capillary-gravity equilibrium.
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